Reader! dear reader! nay, on the chance of your being a young lady, and, therefore, necessarily charming, we will go the whole length of the adjective, and say at once, dearest reader! (of course, asking your pardon for the liberty, and feeling quite sure you are only too ready to grant it, because you are such an amiable sex) don’t you think--(by the way, how very becoming that new plan of plaiting a pig-tail of your back hair, and twisting it round like a coronal over your front hair, is to you--it gives quite a Classical, Grecian, Etruscan, and all that sort of thing, style to your _contour_)--don’t you think, dearest reader, that we have for much too long a time lost sight of, and practically ignored, and altogether cruelly and abominably deserted, and neglected, the Rosebud of Ashburn? and she all the while, in the self-denial of her nature (a species of self-denial, by the way, which would be very generally practised and become exceedingly popular, if we were but sufficiently philanthropic to divulge the recipe), has only been growing prettier and more fatally fascinating every day. Oh, that dangerous, irresistible little Rosebud! There she sat, looking as demure as if she wasn’t always ready to smash any amount of hearts into the smallest possible pieces, on the shortest notice imaginable, toiling busily over an absurd little crochet purse, which she was manufacturing literally “by hook and by crook,” against Mr. Selby’s birthday, when she intended to present him with it “to keep all his sovereigns in;” though if he could have kept _all_ his sovereigns in that pretty little folly, the said folly would very soon have had a sinecure, and poor Mr. Selby have been a ruined snob, instead of a prosperous one. Now, we do not object to mention in confidence, though we should not wish it repeated, that the Rosebud, albeit a most dutiful and affectionate daughter, had, since the boys went to school, found her life very dull and monotonous, and was getting decidedly “hard up” for excitement;--pleasurable excitement would, of course, have been her choice, but even a little mild persecution would not have come amiss, in this dearth of variety: she had expected Sir Thomas Crawley would have given away the living, and some horrid interloper have arrived to turn them out of house and home long ere this, but no; day after day passed by without producing even the ghost of an incident, and the unfortunate and victimised Rosebud was reduced to sit by herself and look pretty, without any one to reap the benefit thereof. What a cruel situation for a vivacious Rosebud!